


shot right through with a bolt of blue

by icemachine



Category: Doom Patrol (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Gen, Nonverbal Communication, Post-Episode: s01e11 Frances Patrol, i just watched it and i have BIG feelings.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-08 18:00:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18628390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icemachine/pseuds/icemachine
Summary: The next time the spirit leaves him, the room is empty, and the color of smoke.





	shot right through with a bolt of blue

**Author's Note:**

> I got the "nonverbal character tries speaking to another in the form of a compilation of words spoken in memories" idea from something. Some piece of media.
> 
> I of course cannot remember what it was. If you remember please tell me.
> 
> Anyway insert the "based off only the tv show" warning here, etc.

The next time the spirit leaves him, the room is empty, and the color of smoke. 

 

It’s not a memory, but Larry wasn’t expecting a memory. All of his memories beyond John are - unsavory, to use the least grotesque term, and his closure with John had been grasped. 

 

It is a rebirth, of Larry Trainor. He can finally stop living in the claw of the past. There is a source of light somewhere, but he cannot make out where it is or what it’s coming from. It’s certainly not sunlight, not here, but it is something similar, a synthesized alien-born touch of luminosity. Larry tries to move closer to it, but the distance maintains itself.

 

So that’s how it’s going to be, then.

 

“Is there a point to this,” he asks; it’s not a question, it’s a confirmation. There isn’t. “Or is—is this just what happens now, after John?”

 

_ After John.  _ It’s strange to think about; weeks ago, even, he could not grasp the concept of an after-John. It has been his life for - sixty years, now, in the harshness of reality, but inside of him he replays---or had replayed---that day over and over, on repeat.  _ Torture.  _ **_Go. G o ._ **

 

At the thought of  _ torture  _ a beach forms. His surroundings are still gray & the sand is gray,  but the body of water is vast. He could wade in it. He could submerge himself in it, and he wouldn’t die.

 

A tempting thought, but it’s not - it’s not what he needs, right now. He doesn’t know what he needs right now. He knows that the silence is too uncomfortable, and he can hear the caw of seagulls, distant from the edge of the water, buried underneath the ground. He knows that there is no color in the water & everything becomes what it is supposed to be: vibrant, and the ocean is an inexpressible color of green, and the sand is just a little bit too blonde, and there is sunlight. 

 

This is new.

 

“What am I doing here?” he asks. “What is the significance of this?”

 

The scenery collapses and the gray returns and then he’s looking into John’s eyes again & John says only one word, only one: “ _ There” _

 

& then he’s looking at his mother’s teeth from a childhood body and she’s saying “ _ there is no”  _ (& Larry knows that the words end with  _ hope for you but— _ )

 

& then he’s staring at himself in the gray, watching himself breathe the word  _ signficance;  _ he did not realize that he was yelling, his voice deafening—-

 

& John again. “I just want you to have fun, Larry,” he says. “Capable of that?” 

 

“What the f—”

 

The scene repeats itself. “Capable of that?” John asks, again. And again: “Capable of that?” like rewinding a tape. “Capable of that?”

 

Larry sighs. “You’re trying to communicate with me, aren’t you?”

 

He’s standing in front of Rita and Jane, flashes of light. “Yeah, genius,” Jane says to Rita, and then John  _ again:  _ “Really, Larry? Just relax.”

 

“No,” he says. “You can’t be John.”

 

Everything melts again. “Why not?” John asks, and the forming memory is the first time he told John that they cannot be together. It hurts. The wounds begin to bleed.

 

“Because it’s—weird,” he admits. “I don’t want to associate you with him. We’re not like that.”

 

“Who do you want me to be?” ‘John’ asks, and this time the memory continues. “What am I to you, Larry, hm? You can’t run forever. You just can’t.”

 

“What do you want  _ us  _ to be? Friends? Do you think we can manage that?”

 

‘John’ opens his mouth, makes a sound—

 

and Larry jumps up from his bed. He’s awake now,  _ why? _

 

“What?” he asks. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

 

There is no response, only a new shattering silence; when he looks down, there is a post-it note on the floor. It has a pen scribble on it—nothing he can understand, but it’s a start. It is certainly a start.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Please kudos+comment if you enjoyed!


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